


We Are Sorry To Inform You That Your Patent Has Been Rejected

by LaLionne (otayuriistheliteralbest)



Series: Drarropoly 2019 [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Drarropoly 2.0 - A Drarry Game/Fest, Drarry, Inventor Draco Malfoy, Inventor Harry Potter, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Pseudonyms, Rivalry, Rivals to Partners
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-19
Updated: 2019-11-19
Packaged: 2021-02-13 11:04:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21493270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/otayuriistheliteralbest/pseuds/LaLionne
Summary: Dear Mr. Patterson,The Department of British Magical Patents are sorry to inform you that your latest patent submission has been rejected due to the similarity it holds to another submission this office had received. As the proposed design lacks novelty, you may modify the design and resubmit under 17 WCL Clause B. Substantial changes would be required, as outlined on the following page.---In which Harry and Draco are popular rival inventors in the Wizarding world under fake names. They agree to meet to discuss their options, when lo and behold...
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Series: Drarropoly 2019 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1545736
Comments: 10
Kudos: 87
Collections: Drarropoly 2.0 - A Drarry Game/Fest





	We Are Sorry To Inform You That Your Patent Has Been Rejected

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to the lovely francowitch for looking this over for me! 
> 
> I hope you enjoy the ridiculous noms de plume that Draco and Harry came up with. ;)
> 
> My prompt:
> 
> Unknown to each other and the rest of the world, Harry and Draco have been the top innovators for years, that is until they both receive notices that their recently submitted patent it too similar to the other's latest submission. Choose either 1) Not Established Relationship -OR- 2) Established Relationship. House level: Minimum: 1471 words - Maximum: 2214 words.

Harry glared down at the piece of parchment the Ministry Owl had delivered. Those little words written in a precise hand grated at him. 

_ Dear Mr. Patterson,  _

_ The Department of British Magical Patents are sorry to inform you that your latest patent submission has been rejected due to the similarity it holds to another submission this office had received. As the proposed design lacks novelty, you may modify the design and resubmit under 17 WCL Clause B. Substantial changes would be required, as outlined on the following page... _

Harry crumpled up the rejection letter. He had been designing One off products for the last several years under a pseudonym, just tinkering with random things that he found in number 12 Grimmauld Place. It turned out that Regulus Black had been quite the inventor before he got caught up in Voldemort’s schemes, and Harry had taken the time to learn what he could from Regulus’s notebooks, stuffed under floorboards much like Harry had done when he lived with the Dursleys. After his first failed attempts, Harry learned and grew as an innovator, until professionals in the field were asking after “Felix Patterson’s” next big invention.

He wasn’t the only one, though. There was another inventor who had popped up around the same time as Harry, a man by the name of Derek Mayne. After the first patent rejection Harry had received had quoted Mayne’s invention as the originator of what Harry had been working on, Harry had written a strongly worded letter to the man, and had somehow ended up with a penpal. The two would argue back-and-forth about the intricacies of various spells and charms, and Harry found himself looking forward to those letters. They always came delivered by standard courier owls and Harry wasn’t even sure if Derek Mayne was the man’s real name. 

At the moment, Harry didn’t really care. He pulled out a sheet of parchment and scribbled a quick, angry letter to Derek and sent it off with his new owl before he had the chance to stop and think. He didn’t even have to wait half a day before a response came back to him:

_ Patterson, _

_ That Combulous charm was my invention and you well know it. If, however, you would like to discuss the invention like civilized Wizards, I will be in the Crossed Mertlock Tavern at seven of the clock this evening.  _

_ Sincerely, _

_ Mayne _

_ P.S. Be sure to wear something nice. I’ll be sitting at the end of the bar in an emerald green cloak. _

Harry didn’t even stop to think once again. He scribbled on the back of the parchment that he would be there and sent it back with his owl, after feeding him a few treats and telling him what a good boy he was. The owl took off into the sky, and the second the letter was out of his hands... he regretted it immediately. How was he supposed to hide his identity in person? He’d dropped out of the Auror training program after his failed attempts to disguise himself with all different kinds of techniques. The best he could hope for was to keep his hood up and be in a darkly-lit corner of the tavern.

Harry sighed and looked at the time. Only a few hours to get ready, and no amount of excuses would get Hermione to hand him a vial of Polyjuice Potion from the Ministry’s carefully-guarded vaults. Cloak hood it was, then. As for the comment about wearing something nice, he had no clue what the other wizard meant, and opted for his least-wrinkled button-up and favourite pair of jet black jeans, since his slacks needed to be washed. He looked at himself in the mirror and nodded. 

_ Good enough, _ Harry thought to himself, and flipped the hood up on his simple black cloak.

Harry arrived at the bustling tavern realizing that he had severely miscalculated. He looked around at all of the patrons of the Crossed Mertlock Tavern; they all wore, if not their Wizarding best, then their second-best. Harry pursed his lips, unimpressed with Mayne’s choice of location. He checked his watch and cursed his timing; he was a whole half hour early for their scheduled appointment. Harry went over to the bar and asked the barkeep, a tall woman with raven-dark hair and sharp eyes, for a lager. She narrowed her eyes at him, but silently poured him a pint, handing it off with a tilt of the head. It was only mildly disconcerting.

“Er, thanks…” Harry said. He spotted an unobtrusive seat in the corner of the room and settled himself there to sit and wait.

When Draco Malfoy came sauntering in at seven o’clock on the dot wearing an emerald green cloak, Harry was in the middle of taking a long swig from his pint. He choked on the amber liquid, doing his best to keep from getting the other man’s attention, but of course he failed miserably.

Malfoy’s eyes widened and he made a beeline for Harry’s table. In his coughing fit, the cloak hood had slid off of his head, revealing his face.

“Potter, what the hell are you doing at my favourite pub?”

Harry finally managed to get his throat cleared enough to croak out,  _ “Mayne?” _ Which pretty much stopped Malfoy dead in his tracks.

“...Patterson?”

The look on Malfoy’s face, a mixture of confusion and horror, set Harry back to choking from laughter, and it took a very long time before he could breathe properly again. By the time he’d gotten his breathing under control, Malfoy had ordered a fancy cocktail and downed it rather quickly.

“Are you seriously telling me that the inventor I’ve been writing to all these years is  _ Harry fucking Potter?” _ Malfoy asked, squinting at Harry from across the table.

“Are you seriously telling me that the inventor of the Experitron Laser Matrix is  _ Draco fucking Malfoy?” _ He ribbed right back.

Malfoy sighed and scratched his head in a decidedly un-Malfoy-like fashion. He raised his glowing wand tip, which summoned the bartender with a second drink, which he took his time to enjoy, sipping thoughtfully. Something seemed to shift behind his eyes, and Draco nodded once, looking right into Harry’s eyes.

“Well then, there’s nothing for it. We seem to be on the same wavelength, inventing-wise, and I’d rather not waste my time producing similar inventions all the time. Want to be partners?”

Harry was reeling to catch up.

“I—what?”

Malfoy huffed. “Partners, Potter. Working together. We can go in on inventions together, or do our own thing and keep muddling about as we’ve been doing for years. Seems like a much better bargain to work together on things instead.”

“Er...sure?” Harry’s mind raced with the possibilities of the partnership, as Malfoy had called it. “Would you want to keep working in our own spaces and just collaborate via owl, or do you want to actually get some kind of space together to work?”

Malfoy rolled his eyes at Harry and pulled a rolled-up piece of blank parchment and a quill from inside his robes. Over the next hour, the pair of them hashed out their plans and goals, what they wanted their newfound partnership to look like. The table was littered with empty pints and glasses, and the parchment was smeared where Harry had forgotten what he was doing and set his sweating pint down on their notes.

A few months later, they were sitting in their newly-founded Patterson & Mayne offices when the owl swooped in from the Ministry. Harry swiped the thick wad of parchment from the owl’s leg before Draco had had the chance to grab it. Draco rolled his eyes and offered the owl a treat from their tin.

Harry tore open the letter with no finesse and scanned the first few lines. He let out a whoop and spun around brandishing the legal document in front of Draco’s face. Draco grimaced and snatched the parchment from Harry’s hands.

“Will you stop waving that in front of my face? You’re going to give me a paper cut, and I don’t want to have to murder you—” Draco stopped talking, having taken in the message the owl had delivered. “They accepted the modified patent?”

He looked up at Harry, grinning. It wasn’t something that Harry had ever seen on Draco’s face before, a look of pure, unadulterated joy, and he laughed, picking Draco up around the waist and swinging him about in a sudden fit of excitement. Then he realized what he was doing and almost fell over trying to set Draco back down on his feet. Harry was flushed with a mixture of elation and embarrassment. He scratched the back of his neck with one hand, glancing up at Draco.

“S-sorry, I got excited,” Harry apologized. 

Pink tinged Draco’s cheeks, and a small smile was tucked in the corner of his mouth, a look that Harry had never seen before, and all Harry could think was,  _ That’s a good look on him. I want to make that happen again. _

And he did. Again and again.

**Author's Note:**

> Want to join the event? Head over to the [Drarropoly Tumblr page](https://gameofdrarry.tumblr.com/) to check it out!


End file.
